Poligrafia nel Quattrocento: Sozomeno da Pistoia

The phenomena of ”digraphia” and ”polygraphia” – that is, medieval copyists’ ability to write using different graphical registers –, are extremely interesting, not only because they reveal the richness and expressivity of the graphical culture of the late Middle Ages, but also because they offer concrete objects of study through which new instruments of paleographical assessment can be identified and fine-tuned. This article reflects on this theme, taking as its model the case of Sozomeno da Pistoia (1387-1458), which is particularly valuable in that it constitutes the only known case of total polygraphia. In the handwriting of Sozomeno one can examine in detail, through a large number of autograph manuscripts distributed over a chronological interval of about fifty years, the transition from the littera moderna (that is, scripts in the gothic tradition) to humanistic scripts, founded on the restoration of the littera antiqua. Reviewing a few of Sozomeno’s autograph manuscripts that can be securely dated, the article delineates the graphical features that characterize the different phases of development of Sozomeno’s handwriting: synchronic digraphia within the system of the littera moderna – that is, double competency in both the littera textualis and the littera cursiva of the fourteenth-century tradition; diachronic digraphia in the transition from the littera moderna to the littera antiqua; synchronic digraphia within the system of the littera antiqua – that is, double competency in the littera antiqua and humanistic cursive